The Editorial Team |

FirstRand Defies S. African Recession as Retail Bank Shines

JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – You wouldn’t say South Africa was in the grips of a recession by looking at the retail-banking unit of FirstRand Ltd., the continent’s largest lender by market value. First National Bank, which accounts for more than half of FirstRand’s profit, is outshining its Johannesburg-based peers by adding customers and deposits, extending more credit to its top clients and boosting transactions through its mobile-phone banking app. A decline in credit losses as a…

Ethiopian Airlines Flight in Near Collision, Flightradar 24 Says

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ADDIS ABABA (Capital Markets in Africa) – An Ethiopian Airlines Group flight almost had a mid-air collision with a Neos SpA plane in Kenyan airspace last week, according to tracking website Flightradar 24. ET858 “narrowly avoided” NO252 at 37,000 feet, the flight tracker said on Twitter. NO252 is the flight between Zanzibar in Tanzania, Kenya’s resort city of Mombasa and Verona, while ET858 is Ethiopian Airline’s route from Johannesburg, South Africa, to Addis Ababa, the Horn of…

Technical Signals Flash Glimmer of Hope for South Africa’s Rand

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JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – South Africa’s rand headed for an advance Thursday for the first time this week after data showed the country’s current-account deficit — a major vulnerability amid the emerging-market sell-off — narrowing from a two-year high. But it’s not only the slight improvement in economic fundamentals and global risk appetite that’s supporting a rand rebound. Technical indicators suggest South Africa’s currency is due for a correction after slumping to a two-year low this week….

Four Seats Enough, Rwanda’s Opposition Declares Vote Victory

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KIGALI (Capital Markets in Africa) – Rwandan opposition parties won just four seats in parliamentary elections — but that’s enough for one of their leaders to hail a victory for democracy in the tightly controlled East African nation. The outcome of the Sept. 3 vote marks the first time a party not in the Rwandan Patriotic Front coalition has secured lawmakers since the country was torn apart by a 1994 genocide. Provisional results show the…

Recession Hands South African Opposition Potential Lifeline

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JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – South Africa’s surprise recession provides an opening for opposition parties heading into next year’s elections against the ruling African National Congress. The question is whether they can capitalize on it. News of the economic slump on Tuesday marked the first real setback for the ANC in months. Since appointing Cyril Ramaphosa as president in February, surveys showed the party making headway in winning back support lost during the scandal-marred rule of…

Ramaphosa’s South African Recession Heightens Election Risk

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JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – President Cyril Ramaphosa’s job of getting South Africa back on track just got a lot more perilous with the surprising news that the economy has slipped into recession. He must walk a fine line between restoring investor confidence battered by almost nine years of misrule by his predecessor, Jacob Zuma, while reducing widespread poverty. And next year’s general elections are looming. The “Ramaphoria” that buoyed the markets and the public at large after…

Steinhoff Ex-CEO Says He Didn’t Know of Financial Irregularities

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JOHANNESBURG (Capital Markets in Africa) – Steinhoff International Holdings NV ex-Chief Executive Officer Markus Jooste said he wasn’t aware of any financial irregularities and quit as head of the global retailer after disagreeing with the board on how to deal with a dispute with auditors Deloitte LLP. In his first public appearance since the accounting crisis that wiped billions of euros of the company’s market value in December, Jooste challenged the widespread view that he is responsible for…

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